Wounds Heal Over Time, But They Leave Scars
by Percabeth Jackson
Summary: Late birthday story for a girl on this site. Rose and Jack had survived the horrible experience of the Titanic and are slowly healing


**_Hello! This fic is a request from vampygurl402 for arashi wolf princesses birthday. However, it is not their birthday anymore. I meant to have it up on her birthday, but family issues prevented me from doing so. And then, as I was about to upload it, my computer crashed, deleting the file completely. So I had to completely rewrite it Not much of an excuse, I know, but it's true. Anyways, here's the fic! Happy late birthday sweetie!_**

**_BTW, this is a Jack lives fic._**

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><p><strong>Jack's POV:<strong>

I gasped as I woke up, shooting straight up in bed. I clutched at my chest as my heart pounded against it. Tears clouding my vision, I reached over looking for the lamp on the bedside table. After a bit of fumbling, I was finally able to get the lamp on. Yellow light flooded the room as I grasped my hair, sobbing. I could still remember part of my dream.

_Cold. So cold. So many screams. Where were the boats? Rose. Rose. Where's Rose?_

I jumped a bit when a hand touched my back. I snapped my head around and saw a pair of bright green eyes filled with worry looking into mine. I sighed relaxing some as my mind came back to the present.

"Sorry Rose, bad dream," I muttered, running a hand down my face.

"It's alright. God only knows how many times this has happened to me since Titanic," She said comfortingly.

_The suction is going to pull you down, but you have to hold our breath and keep kicking, Rose! Don't stop kicking!_

I shook my head, trying to rid my mind temporarily of the memory.

"I know, I'm just trying to be strong for the both of us," I said in annoyance. Why couldn't I get over this?!

"Jack, even the strongest man in the world would break after experiencing something as traumatic as what we went through. We just have to take each day as it comes and get past this sadness that hangs over us," She said crawling onto my lap, wrapping her arms around my neck, and burrowing her face into my neck.

"This coming from the girl that tried to commit suicide from a lesser sadness," I laughed, pulling her closer. I smiled as I remembered how we first met.

_It was around 9 o'clock when I decided to go up on deck for a smoke. Pretty much everyone was either still at dinner, at some party, or winding down for the night so it wasn't very hard to find a bench to lounge on. I laid down on the bench, took out a cigarette and a lighter, lit it, and began to smoke, looking up at the cloudless sky that was filled with stars. I soon found myself thinking of the girl from before._

_'How could someone be so inhumanly beautiful? She looked like a bright ruby that was sitting amongst a pile of inadequate, unoriginal diamonds. I wish I could meet her. Even if it was just for a moment! But she's first class. Why would she think about even going near a street rat like me?' These were some of the many thoughts that ran through my mind as I took a drag. Suddenly, I heard the sound of running heals clopping against the wooden boat deck going past me._

_I sat up, looked to where the sound came from and saw a young woman in a first class dinner dress run around the posts towards the back of the boat. I then heard the sound of sobbing. I stood up, worried, and edged closer, assessing the situation. I watched the girl as she stopped, leaning against a part of the ship catching her breath. It was a bit dark, so I wasn't able to see her very well. My worry began to mount as she slowly edged to the rail that was wrapped around the end of the Titanic. My worry became horror as she began to climb over the rail. She then turned around, looking about the deck as if she was worried someone was there. As she did this, my breath hitched._

_No._

_No. It couldn't be! It was the girl that had been plaguing my thoughts ever since I saw her earlier this afternoon. I rushed closer once she looked away. She stopped moving once she was all the way on the other side of the rail. She leaned forward, hesitating as she watched the churning Atlantic below. I took this as a chance to try and help her._

_"Don't do it,"_

_She seemed surprised. Her hands tightened around the rail as she whipped her head around, her eyes finding mine. Her eyes were unfocused as she studied me._

_"Stay back! Don't come any closer!"_

_As I studied her, I saw the tears rolling down her cheeks. My heart broke seeing how desperate she looked._

_"Take my hand. I'll pull you back in" I said, offering my hand, hoping with my entire being that she'd grab it._

_"No! Stay where you are! I mean it. I'll let go!" Her voice wavered as she said this. She turned around to look back down at the water. I then decided to try a different method. I took a step forward and when she turned to face me, I held my hands up, showing her that I meant no harm. I then edged closer until I was at the rail, all the while holding up my cigarette. I stopped, took one last drag, and then threw it over the edge, watching as it disappeared. It was silent for a moment as we looked down at the blackness below._

_"No you won't," She looked over at me, a spark of outrage in her eyes. 'Good' I thought. 'Anger is better than hopelessness'_

_"What do you mean 'no I won't'? Don't presume to tell me what I will or will not do! You don't know me!" She snapped at me, a faint blush of anger spreading across her cheeks._

_"You would have done it already. Now come on, take my hand," I said offering her my hand again. She looked confused now, her eyes blurring with tears. She quickly wiped her eyes but threw her hand back down as she almost lost her balance. I leaped forward a bit, as if to catch her should she fall._

_"You're distracting me. Go away," She sighed, looking back down at the Atlantic. I shrugged my shoulders, a look of stubborn determination on my face._

_"I can't. I'm involved now. If you let go, I'll have to jump in after you," I said looking over at her._

_"Don't be absurd! You'll be killed!" She scoffed at the idea._

_"I'm a good swimmer," I shrugged as I slowly began to remove my jacket. I then began to unlace my shoes_

_"The fall alone would kill you," she muttered, her resolve deteriorating as the thought of jumping began to leave her; her eyes beginning to lose the cloudiness that had consumed them._

_"It would hurt. I'm not saying it wouldn't. To be honest, I'm a lot more concerned about that water being so cold," I said, wincing at the reminder of when I fell into the lake all those years ago. The girl looked down, the reality of the situation sinking in a bit more._

_"How cold?" She asks after a moment of tense silence._

_"Freezing. Maybe a couple degrees over," I shrugged as I began taking off the now untied shoes. I stood up, my hands deep in my pockets._

_"You, uh, ever been to Wisconsin?" I asked her. She turned to me, a perplexed look upon her face._

_"No," she said, probably wondering where I was going with this._

_"Well they have some of the coldest winters around, and I grew up there near Chippewa Falls. Once, when I was a kid, me and my father were ice-fishing out on lake Wissota..." I paused realizing something. "Ice-fishing's where you chop a hole in the..."_

_"I know what ice-fishing is!" She interrupted me, exasperated. I held my hands up in surrender._

_"Sorry. Just... you look like kind of an indoor girl...Anyway, I went through some tin ice and I'm tellin' ya, water that cold...like that right down there...it hits you like a thousand knives stabbing all over your body. You can't breath, you can't think...at least not about anything but the pain," I said lost in his memory. Snapping out of it, I took off my other shoe and stood up._

_"Which is why I'm not looking forward to jumping in after you," _Lie_. " But, like I said, I don't have a choice," I said smiling over at her._

_"I guess I'm kind of hoping you'll come back over the rail and get me off the hook here," I said._

_"You're crazy!" She said, looking at him bemused. I shrugged._

_"That's what everybody says. But, with all due respect miss, I'm not the one hanging off the back of a ship here," I said leaning towards her. I held out my hand again._

_"Come on. You don't want to do this. Give me your hand," I said, hoping that this time, she'd listen. She looked into my eyes and saw something in them that made up her mind. Her eyes softened and she nodded, moving her hand into mine and turned around, now facing me. I smiled at her._

_"I'm Jack Dawson," I said grinning at the fact that I succeeded in getting her to listen to me._

_"Rose Dewitt Bukater," She said breathlessly. I chucked a bit._

_"I'm going to have to get you to write that one down," She breathlessly laughed at that._

I came back to the present when Rose smacked me on the chest.

"Hey! That's not fair and you know it. Plus, if I hadn't done that, we would have never met," She said smiling up at him.

"...Okay, I'll give you that one. Haha, remember what you came down to third class the next morning? You sure gave... Fabrizio and Tommy a shock," I said, hesitating over my late friend's names. My heart clenched in my chest as I remembered their reactions.

_I was down in the third class social room with Fabrizio and Tommy when the room went silent. I looked up confused. I followed everyone's gazes and saw Rose standing there in her fiery glory. She was looking around the room, her face displaying her uncomfortableness. I smiled when I saw that she had tried to dress to blend in, but her clothes were still obviously first class material. My smile grew even wider when she noticed me and came over, a smile matching mine on her face._

_"Hello Jack," she said. Tommy and Fabrizio sat gawking at her in shock._

Guess angels flew out of my ass then_ I thought smugly._

_"Hello again," I said, nodding at her. She looked around as everyone started to talk again, but not as loudly, trying to hear what was going on._

_"Could I speak to you in private?" She asked looking me._

_"Uh, yes. Of course. After you," I said motioning for her to exit, standing as I said so. As we headed towards the exit, I looked back over my shoulder, one eyebrow raised, at Fabrizio and Tommy. They stared after us in shocked silence, dumfounded looks upon their faces._

Rose rubbed my back sympathetically. We sat in silence as I thought of how much had changed since that fateful night five years before. Rose gave up her first class lifestyle and found a job as an actress in the theater production company that was nearby where we lived. Her job and my sketches, which Rose convinced me to raise to $2 a piece, created a comfortable second class way of life for us. We made some new friends who had recently moved here. Their names were Amelia and Rory Williams.

_A couple had just moved in a couple houses down from us. Rose had invited them over for dinner tonight to welcome them to the area, so we were setting up the dining room when a knock sounded at the door._

_"I'll finish here," I said smiling over at Rose. She kissed my cheek and then left to go answer the door._

_A little later, after we had eaten, we were situated in the living room talking._

_"So why did you move here?" Rose asked the couple. Amelia, or Amy as she told us to call her, was a red haired Scottish woman. Her husband was a blond haired Brit with a rather large nose._

_"We needed a change in scenery. We just recently went through a rather traumatic experience, so we decided to move," Rory said smiling sadly._

_"Oh my god, what happened?" Rose said, her eyes sympathetic. _

_"We got separated from our daughter and her husband, my best friend, and they think we're dead. We can't contact them cause they are constantly traveling," Amy said looking down. Rory wrapped his arms around her in comfort._

_"I am so sorry..." Rose said, grabbing my hand. We both looked on as the two pulled themselves together. _

Ever since then, we always have dinner together on Sundays, taking in the comfort we offered each other.

Whenever we get the chance in the week, Rose and I go to the nearby soup kitchen and help around with things. Along with that, we are often seen at the nearby orphanage, helping in any way we can. The children there absolutely love Rose. They all think she's some princess that was sent to them to be their guardian angel. A couple of the boys there even staked their claim on her.

_We had been here for less than an hour and there already was a commotion occurring in the play room. I walked into the room to see what was going on._

_"She's mine!"_

_"No, she's mine"_

_"Whoa there, what's the problem here?" I interrupted. The two four-year-olds stopped and looked at me._

_"He started it!"_

_"No! He did!"_

_"Hey, hey, hey! I don't care who started it! I just want to know what happened," I said smiling at them._

_"He said miss Rose was going to marry him someday, but thats not true cause she's mine..."_

_"She is too!"_

_"Is not!"_

_"Is too!" _

_"Is not!"_

_"Is..." I cut in._

_"Whoa! Hey now, there isn't a reason to fight! Besides, both of you are wrong. Rose is mine," I said smugly. They both looked at me._

_"No she's not!"_

_"Yes she is."_

_"No!"_

_"Yes."_

_"No!"_

_"Yes."_

_"NO NO NO!"_

_"What is going on here?" The three of us froze as we were interrupted. We looked up to see Rose looking down at us, an amused expression on her face._

_"Well Rose, you see..."_

_"Miss Rose, you're mine right?"_

_"No, she not! You're mine right?"_

_"C'mon Rose, tell these two children who you are with." I said waiting for her to side with me._

_"I'm all of yours," Huh?_

_"But Rose!"_

_"No Jack. Don't you know how to share?" She said two brats behind her snickered. I stuck out my tongue at them as Rose walked away._

_"She's so only mine," I muttered._

I smirked as I thought back to that.

"You really need to learn how to share," I looked down at Rose in shock.

"I know that look! It's your 'cat-caught-the-canary' look. You only get that look when something like what happened with those boys at the orphanage happened," She said rolling her eyes. A mischievous smirk grew on my face.

"Oh yeah?" I grabbed her and pulled her far enough away to gain access to her. Soon, the room was filled with shrieks of laughter as I attacked her sides with my fingers.

We've had problems. It was never anything too bad, or that we couldn't handle. We still don't know what to do with that thrice-damned necklace of Cal's that we found.

_We were standing on the deck of the Carpathia. It was pouring out, but we ignored this as we went past the Statue of Liberty. We held hands in silence, mourning those who will never see this sight. We were startled from our silence when a voice called out next to us._

_"What are your names?" We turned to see a man from the crew standing beside us under an umbrella, holding a clipboard._

_"Jack Dawson,"_

_"Dawson. Rose Dawson," I snapped my head over to look at her as the man wrote our names down and left. _

_"What? I'm not going back to my old life, and if I kept my old name, Cal would be able to find me," She shrugged. I smiled a bit and held her close to my side. We were silent for a moment before I felt Rose tense up next to me. _

_"What?" Instead of answering me, she simply pulled her hand from the coat she was wearing. My jaw dropped in shock as I comprehended what I was looking at._

_The Heart of the Ocean._

_"Jesus..." I muttered. Rose nodded in agreement as we gazed at it in shock and a hint of disgust._

_"What are we gong to with it?" I asked. Rose shrugged her shoulders, just as stumped as I was._

It is currently sitting in a drawer somewhere in Rose's jewelry box. I finally relented my attack on her and we settled back onto the bed, wrapped in each other's arms. Our lives wasn't perfect. We had arguments, we had a couple close calls involving Cal, and we definitely had enough skeletons in our closet to create an army. But we were pulling through, slowly and surely climbing our way out of the dark precipice that we had fallen into. We won't ever be fully healed, after all, when a plate breaks, even if you glue it back together, there are still cracks that could snap apart at any moment. Yet, despite that, Rose and I found our own bit of happiness and I wouldn't trade that for the world.

Even though it caused me much heartbreak, winning that ticket was and forever will be the best thing that has ever happened to me.


End file.
